Cao paid 30,000 yuan ($4,398.83) and moved to the 75-square-meter new apartment. Before moving out, all the five families had a celebration dinner. "Although the old house had traffic facilities, it suffered from mould in the rainy season. Along the river, it was moist in the house," she told Beijing Review. Since this house was privately owned, Cao and her family had to maintain this house by themselves. Windows and doors were deformed and in the house, it was cold in winter but hot in summer.

"The new apartment has good facilities and it is dry here," Cao smiled.

Like most of the people in Suzhou, Cao and her husband now live a leisurely life. "Before retirement, besides work, we just did shopping and reading. Now we have more time for swimming," Zhang Fan, Cao's 70-year-old husband, said.

Cao and her husband also like having tea and playing mahjong in the city's garden parks. Famous for its gardens, Suzhou offers free access to them for seniors above 70 and half fare to those above 60. A full-price annual pass costs 120 yuan ($17.6).

Sometimes, Cao and her husband travel to the ancient villages around Suzhou, including Zhouzhuang and Tongli, or nearby cities in the Yangtze River Delta, such as Nanjing and Hangzhou, which are about two hours away by bus.

Development and convenience

Zhang Yun, 29, moved to Suzhou in early 2007 when she married a young man who was working in the city. Before coming to Suzhou, she had studied and worked in Beijing for six years. Now, she lives with her husband and nine-month-old daughter in a newly built community in the Industrial Park of Suzhou. The industrial park has hospitals, supermarkets, sports centers and bus routes running to its gate.

Zhang and her husband love going to bars at weekends, although the range of music is limited to disco. If they want to go shopping in department stores, they visit Guanqian Street in the old town. Zhang also takes trips to Shanghai for shopping. "The price of clothes in Suzhou is the same as in Shanghai, but there are few promotions here," Zhang told Beijing Review.

Shanghai is just 30 minutes by fast train from Suzhou. According to Zhang, it takes just one hour from her home to Huaihai Road, Shanghai's most prosperous business area: 15 minutes' drive from her home to the railway station, 30 minutes on the train from Suzhou to Shanghai and 15 minutes on the subway to Huaihai Road. Once Zhang and her husband arranged to meet a relative in Shanghai at a hospital there. It took them just an hour to get to the hospital, while the relative in Shanghai spent two hours in traffic.

According to Shi Bojun, Zhang's husband, because of the convenient transport between the two cities, many companies choose to have offices in Shanghai but set up factories in Suzhou. After the high-speed railway lines between Beijing and Shanghai are completed, with trains stopping in Suzhou, it will take only 15 minutes from Suzhou to Shanghai. "People living in Suzhou will be able to work in Shanghai. I will also consider doing so," Shi told Beijing Review.